Symbolist Artists Quotes

Few artists are able to accurately assess just how valuable and great their work is - or how much it will be appreciated by its audience. In other words, insecurity is the name of the game. ~ Suzanne Falter-Barns

When Aaron arrived at my place - a ground-floor studio fitting my full-size bed, desk, and TV - he came bearing gifts: The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron and two red tension balls. "I figure they'll help you relax and write," he said. We watched my favorite relationship ~ Janet Mock

I don't aestheticize anything. I don't even use lights. The working girls do one thing all day: They make themselves pretty. That's their job and their money. In a way, I had the best makeup artists, hairdressers, and art designers in the world. ~ Michael Glawogger

What you respond to in any work of art is the artist's struggle against his or her limitations ~ Kurt Vonnegut

She was a sweet girl but not really pretty, a rough sketch of a woman with a little of everything in her, one of those silhouettes which artists draw in three strokes on the tablecloth in a café after dinner, between a glass of brandy and a cigarette. Nature sometimes turns out creatures like that. ~ Guy De Maupassant

Sheer egoism ... Writers share this characteristic with scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers, successful businessmen - in short, with the whole top crust of humanity. ~ George Orwell

The love of spectacles was the taste, or rather passion, of the Syrians: the most skilful artists were procured form the adjacent cities; a considerable share of the revenue was devoted to the public amusements; and the magnificence of the games of the theatre and circus was considered as the happiness, and as the glory, of Antioch. ~ Edward Gibbon

The canvas is the door to another dimension. The paintbrush is the key. ~ Luhraw

The consensus seems to be this: we should be deeply Christian artists. But that doesn't mean we should be something called Christian artists or that whatever we produce should be called Christian art. We should simply focus on our craft, on making the best art we can. We should understand that people will and should resonate with our work not because it is Christian but because it is good. Above all, Christians should make good art, true art; art unafraid of exploring mystery, portraying evil, and looking for truth wherever it appears. ~ Brett McCracken

I have just returned from Arenas and feel very tired. His Excellency loaded me with a thousand honours; I have painted his portrait and that of his wife and boy and girl with unexpected success, for other artists had been there previously and not been successful. ~ Francisco Goya

As I see it, all of them - Tachists, Action Painters, Informel artists, and the rest - are only part of an Informel movement that covers a lot of other things as well. I think there's an Informel element in Beuys, as well; but it all began with Duchamp and chance, or with Mondrian, or with the Impressionists. The Informel is the opposite of the constructional quality of classicism - the age of kings, or clearly formed hierarchies. ~ Gerhard Richter

Artists can color the sky red because they know it's blue. Those of us who aren't artists must color things the way they really are or people might think we're stupid. ~ Jules Feiffer

I like adding little elements into the final mix. I'm more fond of the '70s glam than '80s. I have that style of vocals ... there are a lot of pop artists who are using the glam vibe in their music. I'm part of that wave. ~ Adam Lambert

In an artist's life, death is perhaps not the most difficult thing. ~ Vincent Van Gogh

Creation is the artist's true function; where there is no creation there is no art. ~ Henri Matisse

What a funny thing painting is. The abstract painters always insist on their connection with the visible reality, while the so called figurative artists insist that what they really care about, is the abstract qualities of life. ~ Marlene Dumas

I've admired Alicia Keys since before I got into the music industry, just everything she represents as a female artist. ~ Melanie Fiona

There comes a moment in a young artist's life when he knows he has to bring something to the stage from within himself. He has to put in something in order to be able to take something. ~ Mikhail Baryshnikov

Art has been hijacked by nonartists. It's been taken over by bookkeeping. The whole thing is so corrupt. But I suppose that's okay. For artists, everything is grist for the mill. Artists are like cockroaches; we can't be stamped out. ~ Elaine De Kooning

Art is like a stock with a decent return for people in finance, and they get to feel like they are involved with culture, spend time with artists, as part of their dividend. ~ Rachel Kushner

All alone, or in two's,
The ones who really love you
Walk up and down outside the wall.
Some hand in hand
And some gathered together in bands.
The bleeding hearts and artists
Make their stand.
And when they've given you their all
Some stagger and fall, after all it's not easy
Banging your heart against some mad bugger's wall. ~ Roger Waters

Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist, and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world. ~ Edward Hopper

AN ARTIST'S PRAYER
O Great Creator,
We are gathered together in your name
That we may be of greater service to you
And to our fellows.
We offer ourselves to you as instruments.
We open ourselves to your creativity in our lives.
We surrender to you our old ideas.
We welcome your new and more expansive ideas.
We trust that you will lead us.
We trust that it is safe to follow you.
We know you created us and that creativity
Is your nature and our own.
We ask you to unfold our lives
According to your plan, not our low self-worth.
Help us to believe that it is not too late
And that we are not too small or too flawed
To be healed -
By you and through each other - and made whole.
Help us to love one another,
To nurture each other's unfolding,
To encourage each other's growth,
And understand each other's fears.
Help us to know that we are not alone,
That we are loved and lovable.
Help us to create as an act of worship to you. ~ Julia Cameron

Actually solving the puzzles in the book isn't going to improve anyone's writing, but "trying to solve the puzzle" is one way to think about what a lot of us - writers and other artists - do every day. Step one is to recognize the problem, step two is deciding what constraints you want to impose or respect, and step three is finding a pleasing/surprising/exciting solution. ~ Peter Turchi

Artists are notoriously snooty and suspicious of anything coming from the business community. ~ David Byrne

One thing I've always loved doing is hanging out and talking music with other artists. ~ Nikki Sixx

It is dangerous it seems to me for a civilization when there is a complete abyss betewen people in general and the artists. Or is it always so? The poets who are most ardently on the people's side write in such a way that the people cannot see rhyme nor reason to their work. ~ May Sarton

It is a mistake for a sculptor or a painter to speak or write very often about his job. It releases tension needed for his work. ~ Henry Moore

I had a lot of fun [on The Voice] and I learned a whole lot about reality TV, for one, and how they kind of use the artists as characters to make a hit TV show. ~ Curtis Grimes

I'm often wary of using the word 'inspiration' to introduce my work
it sounds too much like a sun shower from the heavens, absorbed by a passive individual enjoying an especially receptive moment. While that may be the case on rare occasions, the reality is usually far more prosaic. Staring at a blank piece of paper, I can't think of anything original. I feel utterly uninspired and unreceptive. It's the familiar malaise of 'artist's block' and in such circumstances there is only one thing to do: just start drawing. ~ Shaun Tan

It is not for nothing that artists have called their works the children of their brains and likened the pains of production to the pains of childbirth. ~ W. Somerset Maugham

In a sense, the music business and I haven't always been the best of bedfellows. Artists often have to fight their corner. Your music goes through these filters of record labels and media, and you're hoping you'll find someone who'll help you get your work into the world. ~ Annie Lennox

I have been influenced by many different artists at many different stages of my life. Starting out, it was people like Elton John, Billy Joel, Ben Folds, and Fiona Apple. As I got older I got deeper into the work of bands like the Beatles, artists like Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, Etta James, and Joni Mitchell. ~ Sara Bareilles

You can learn a lot from children because they see things new every day. That's the beauty of what you want to achieve as an artist - seeing things in a different way. Kids are constantly saying things that are funny and surprising and their observations are just ... you know, they're like little artists themselves. ~ Tim Burton

All real philosophers have been artists in the realm of concepts. ~ Rudolf Steiner

It is important that artists are not outside the equation, we don't stand on the sidelines. Artists are part of the story of a response, we cannot stand aside and let others make the response. ~ Anish Kapoor

I've found that limitations can be an artist's best friend sometimes. ~ Michael Gungor

The elements of voice and style are braided together like twine, consisting of these attempts to copy other artists, or an instrument, or even the sound of a bird or passing train. Added to these characteristics are emotions and thoughts that register as various vocal quirks, like hiccups, sighs, growls, warbles - a practically limitless assortment of choices. Most of these choices are made at the speed of sound on a subconscious level, or one would be completely overwhelmed by the task. ~ Linda Ronstadt

There are so many great artists, I think, who kind of suffer from being icons, legends, acknowledged masters. ~ Richard Linklater

General belief is "There is no real magic, only tricks" but a great magician compel people not to trust that belief and make them believe, after all "There does exist a real magic". ~ Amit Kalantri

All that matters is that artists keep reminding mortals about what really matters: the wonder, the glory, the madness, the importance and the improbability of love. ~ Hannah Mary Rothschild

Herman Melville said that artists have to take a dive and either you hit your head on a rock and you split your skull and you die ... or that blow to the head is so inspiring that you come back and do the best work that you ever did. BUT you have to take the dive and you do not know what the results will be. ~ Maurice Sendak

A society without jaywalkers might indicate a society without artists. ~ Paul Theroux

When artists work well, they connect people to themselves, and they stitch people to one another, through this shared experience of discovering a connection that wasn't visible before. Have you ever noticed that this looks like this? And with the same delight that we took as children in seeing a face in a cloud, grown-up artists draw the lines between the bigger dots of grown-up life: sex, love, vanity, violence, illness, death. ~ Amanda Palmer

I think that fashion and music go hand-in-hand, and they always should. It's the artist's job to create imagery that matches the music ... I think they're very intertwined. ~ Lady Gaga